Mike Woods column: Packers depend on Rodgers more than ever

The Packers need quarterback Aaron Rodgers to make up for a reshuffled offensive line and a weak running game.

Because 2012 is looking more and more like 2010 with each dropping player, we understand where the narrative is heading.

Can Aaron Rodgers do it again?

The Green Bay Packers quarterback would not care for the question because the cliché is dead-on: football is the ultimate team game. But with an offense that continues to lose spark plugs, and with the inability to replace them a stark reality, it will be Rodgers who will be asked to put the Packers on his shoulders if they are to make another Super Bowl run.

When you're an NFL MVP, a Super Bowl MVP and, most important, you've done it before under vastly similar circumstances, it comes with the territory.

The Packers certainly have their issues, but the good news is so does every other playoff-bound team. There is no bona fide Darth Vader out there, which means a hot team with a hot quarterback will be very well positioned to march to New Orleans.

The Packers defense will be better down the stretch, especially when Clay Matthews and Charles Woodson are back in the lineup. And with the experience and success that several of the first- and second-year players have had over the past several games, one would only expect this will be a strong, deep unit when it matters most.

The offense isn't as fortunate. Aside from Jordy Nelson, the players they need to come back in all likelihood won't be. Running backs Cedric Benson and James Starks will be missed, as will tackle Bryan Bulaga.

The Packers may have to rely on Rodgers more than they would prefer, as a reshuffled offensive line and injuries to the running backs will tilt the balance of the offense to Rodgers' right arm.

While the Packers still have a shot at the No. 2 seed in the playoffs with four games to play, this is an offense in its current form that, like 2010, would fare better in warmer climates and under the protection of a dome.

So if the Packers ended up as a wild-card team, and even the sixth seed, it would not necessarily be a bad thing.

So what would it take?

Obviously, another playoff performance like 2010, which was almost but not quite as good as his 2011 season. So we're talking a completion rate of around 68 percent, a yards-per-pass-attempt between 8.3 and 9.2, a TD-to-interception ratio in the neighborhood of 7-to-1 and a quarterback rating in the 112 range.

Those numbers are pretty much what he did in those two situations, or an average of the two.

Granted that's a very high level of play, but the point is no one is expecting Rodgers to do something that he hasn't done before.

A respectable if not efficient running game would clearly be the preferred choice, because it would make the Packers more than one-dimensional and less predictable.

But that's when having a quarterback of Rodgers' quality is underscored.

Rodgers has well established that he's all in when it comes to being a team guy and spreading the gospel of the team concept.

But the reality is, with a somewhat withered offense, his team will need him more than before as the playoffs arrive.

It has been and always will be his team. But like in 2010, it's his team more than ever.